


Bad Days

by Mildredo



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angsty Schmoop, Established Relationship, F/M, Living Together, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Schmoop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-15
Updated: 2015-11-15
Packaged: 2018-05-01 19:56:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5218832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mildredo/pseuds/Mildredo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Amy has Bad Days. Sometimes she has Very Bad Days.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bad Days

Amy thinks she’s good at hiding when she’s having a Bad Day, but she can’t hide all of her tells. Her right leg bounces involuntarily and she can’t seem to make it stop. She taps her pen against the desk in multiples of three and reacts angrily if she’s interrupted at the wrong time. She hums and fidgets and tugs at her hair. She doesn’t drink all day because the thought of using the shared bathroom is too horrifying and the dehydration and caffeine deprivation make her even crankier. But it’s okay, she insists, because she can hide it at work. She can function, she can be professional, she can push it down and do her job and unless someone was looking closely they wouldn’t know. Maybe at most they’d think she was in a bad mood.

But Jake - Jake knows. Jake has seen it all. He’s seen the troughs and valleys of Amy’s mind spread out, bare and raw. He’s seen the way she can vacuum the same room for an hour. He knows that she has to check all the locks before she can sleep and that she has to be the one to turn out the bedroom light. He’s helped her count out her pills for the week, he’s been with her to see her therapist, he’s gone to the pharmacy to pick up her prescription. He’s come home on Amy’s days off to find her in old sweatpants and yellow gloves, her hair pulled back haphazardly, scrubbing worktops or tables or window frames with a nearly empty bottle of disinfectant in her hand, her eyes frantic and her breathing heavy, labored.

Jake was scared the first time, but it’s easy now. He knows the drill. Amy stops; Jake coming home is enough of a change to break the spiral. She takes a few shuddering breaths and Jake smiles, reaches out a hand. She takes it, trembling, and he pulls her into him and when she feels safe, she cries into Jake’s chest. He guides her to somewhere they can sit together - the sofa or the bed, usually, but sometimes they’re too far and they end up on the floor, leaning against the wall as Amy breaks down and begins to slowly build herself back up. When she can breathe again, she peels the gloves from her hands and rubs at her wet, sore eyes with the pad of her thumb. She inhales deeply, steadily, and smiles.

“Thank you,” she says, though Jake is never entirely sure what she’s thanking him for. Coming home? Knowing what to do? Loving her despite her broken brain, her misfiring neurons, her chemical imbalances? “There was a smudge on the TV screen. So I wiped it off and while I was there I noticed some dust on the coffee table. And then…”

Jake presses a kiss into Amy’s messy hair.

“I know.”

When Amy’s having a Bad Day, the smallest thing can turn it into a Very Bad Day. A typo in the newspaper. A misaligned book on the shelf. An unwashed plate left in the sink. A smudge on the TV screen. She was worse when she lived alone. There was nothing but her and her spiral and the filth of Brooklyn all over her walls, her carpet, herself. She’s not fixed - she’ll never be fixed - but living with Jake helps. Nothing shocks him. He’s calm and loving and understanding. She’ll never be fixed, but she’ll always have Jake.


End file.
